In-house Ofsted

Monday TMEssex, Tuesday a busy day at school at the end of which an instruction to staff over the school communication system (Bing Bong) to check their e-mail and an SMS text as back up. It’s the end of the afternoon – is it “O”? No but yes. The school would have an in-house exercise with lesson observations. After digesting the fact, what to do first? Well Digital leaders had missed last week’s meeting, so they met first and continued their IWB training development and the coding group showed is some of their work in a video presentation.

Back to my room – Wednesday included the start of an E-safety assessment for my Yr 7 ICT class – would I be observed in non specialist subject? and three revision lessons for Years 7 and 8 based on revision stations and the 7es lesson plan (@HThompson1982, which I had first seen explained at Pedagoolondon).

My first class of the day was observed by the Head Teacher. We were just into the revision station phase,. Our assessment preparation was split into 4 table activities. Three were text linked to tasks and the fourth was manned by me as an alternative information source. Every 5 minutes table groups rotated to a new topic – these were on the board with page references and supported by my TA and pupils who took on leadership roles within their teams. The revision was active, the feedback positive and all my observation points from November were seen to be addressed. A solid 2 (Good), a full feedback due at some point. The 7es plan caused some confusion but I am willing to present a strong argument for its use as I and the pupils in my groups are responding well to it and it links to our ongoing development of the use of the SOLO taxonomy – see precious posts.

This is the ICT lesson used – a new approach I am proposing in the ICT department as well.